Sept. 16 (Bloomberg) -- President Barack Obama earns high marks for his performance even as Americans express anxiety about his domestic policies. One possible reason: Republicans arenât offering an alternative.

A Bloomberg News poll gives Obama a job-approval rating of 56 percent and 61 percent say they feel favorably about him. Still, respondents are divided over the presidentâs handling of health care and the economy, while giving him a negative grade on the growth of the budget deficit.

âAmericans are despairing of the federal deficit in the wake of several huge government spending programs,â says J. Ann Selzer, the president of Selzer & Co., a Des Moines, Iowa-based firm that conducted the poll. âHealth care is one more big- ticket item and taxpayers appear to believe at some point they, or their children, will hold the bag.â

Republicans arenât benefiting from the negative sentiment toward the economic policies, the poll shows. The survey finds that by about a 2-to-1 margin, Americans say Obama is doing a better job on the economy than his predecessor, George W. Bush.

She says some of the public is too impatient and Obama has kept the economy from getting worse. âHe walked into a hornetsâ nest when he came into office,â and the stimulus and the bailouts of the auto and financial industries have helped, she says.

Respondents also say by 40 percent to 32 percent that they would vote for a Democratic candidate for Congress in 2010. A slight plurality, 48 percent to 44 percent, has a favorable opinion of the Democratic Party. The Republican Party, by 52 percent to 38 percent, gets an unfavorable rating.

The survey finds that even as Obama has tried in recent months to stress the urgency of overhauling health care, for almost half of Americans, the economy is the most important issue facing the country. Health care comes second, with 23 percent.

Slightly more Americans are pessimistic than optimistic about the U.S. governmentâs economic plan. Americans are divided over the presidentâs handling of the issue as well as over whether his stimulus program will create jobs. They are also about evenly divided over his handling of health care.

The Bloomberg Poll is based on interviews with 1,004 U.S. adults ages 18 or older from Sept. 10-14. The margin of error is plus or minus 3.1 percentage points.

Deficit Concerns

Pessimism over Obamaâs handling of the budget deficit is a major factor behind the negative attitudes.

Americans consider the deficit such a problem that a majority, 62 percent, say they would be willing to risk a longer-lasting recession to avoid more government spending. Just 28 percent say they thought more spending would do the most good to help the economy.

Poll respondent Bruce Varholy, a 60-year-old builder from York, Pennsylvania who is an independent voter, is among the 52 percent of Americans who say the country is on the wrong track.

âThe amount of money that is being squandered right now by the government is going to really hurt us down the road,â he says. âI just view the government as so totally corrupt I donât even know how it functions.â

Tab for Grandchildren

Even some who support Obama say they are concerned about spending. âI donât want to see my grandchildren and great grandchildren have to have this on their backs when they become adults,â says Lawrence, the poll respondent from Virginia.

While they express anxiety about spending, home values, retirement savings and household income, just 33 percent of respondents say they have no confidence Obamaâs team will be able to fix the problems that caused the nationâs financial crisis.

More than half, 54 percent, say they are also mostly optimistic about the ability of the government to ultimately help the economy recover.

âA year ago we were really standing at the edge of the cliff,â says poll respondent Mike Dole, a 64-year-old Veterans Affairs employee in Bethesda, Maryland. âSomething needed to be done very, very severely, and he did it.â

Some differences in impressions of the U.S. economic policy appear when answers are broken down by demographic groups. Fifty-eight percent of women say they are mostly optimistic about the ability of the government to help the economy recover and grow, compared with 49 percent of men.

Optimism Among Blacks

In a sign that Obamaâs support from black voters during the election is carrying over to his presidency, blacks are also far more optimistic than whites, with 83 percent expressing optimism compared with 48 percent of whites.

While Americans are about equally divided over Obamaâs record on health care, when it comes to foreign policy he enjoys solid approval.

Sixty percent of poll respondents approve of the job Obama is doing in managing relations with other countries, and 51 percent approve of his policies on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Obamaâs 61 percent favorable rating is matched by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, his former competitor for the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination, who scores 62 percent.

Both fare better than some other major political figures, including Democratic Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, who gets an unfavorable rating of 48 percent, and former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, the former Republican vice presidential candidate, who has the highest unfavorable numbers of all, at 55 percent. Former Republican House Speaker Newt Gingrich gets 39 percent.

The poll also probes attitudes on climate change, finding that 40 percent of Americans view it as a major threat, compared with 31 percent who say itâs a minor threat and just 27 percent who say itâs no real threat at all.

Other than the odd heckle are the Republicans actually singing from the same song book these days I see the same disarray amongst the Republicans as I saw with the Conservatives after they were ousted by Labour in the UK.

One of the problems Republicans are going to face in the upcoming elections, is the fact that their conservative base is so angry and fired up. That base will likely reject candidates that are moderate enough to have cross over appeal. After John McCain's defeat, the republican base will want hardcore true social conservatives. Hardcore social conservatives will be seen as reactionaries (outside of the South) and have a hard time adding states that John McCain did not win. The Libertarian wing of the party would probably have the best shot of drawing in younger voters, but the social conservatives are just too powerful within the party and will dominate from here on out.

Back in 1994 the Republicans came up with the "Contract with America" it was not just a "we hate Bill Clinton" proclamination, but tangible alternative ideas. The 1994 Assault weapons ban also helped the republicans, as it pissed the hell out of many gunowners, who were also democrats. Now there is a 2nd amendment Supreme court ruling, and the dems have learned a very painful lesson, so they are unlikely to try and push that agenda before any elections.

If the republicans only offer up a platform of "we hate Obama, and he is not really the president and a Nazi (a black one at that??) and a socialist...they will succeed in uniting all of the right wing and lots of the posters on ET, but how many moderates will they attract? Is that a viable strategy to get young voters? Yes, we know that they will carry the South, but that is just not enough for them to become a dominate party again.

During the Bush years the Republicans were the majority party, for the most part. Yet they did not aggressively push an agenda of shrinking government. They slowed the growth of government, but they did not eliminate whole departments as once promised. Fighting the War on Terror would naturally call for growth in the DOD, various Intelligence services and Homeland Security, but not so much everything else. The fact that they allowed govt to continue to grow and approved the wall street bailouts, put a stamp of approval on big government before the eyes of the American people.

One of the problems Republicans are going to face in the upcoming elections, is the fact that their conservative base is so angry and fired up. That base will likely reject candidates that are moderate enough to have cross over appeal. After John McCain's defeat, the republican base will want hardcore true social conservatives. Hardcore social conservatives will be seen as reactionaries (outside of the South) and have a hard time adding states that John McCain did not win. The Libertarian wing of the party would probably have the best shot of drawing in younger voters, but the social conservatives are just too powerful within the party and will dominate from here on out.

Back in 1994 the Republicans came up with the "Contract with America" it was not just a "we hate Bill Clinton" proclamination, but tangible alternative ideas. The 1994 Assault weapons ban also helped the republicans, as it pissed the hell out of many gunowners, who were also democrats. Now there is a 2nd amendment Supreme court ruling, and the dems have learned a very painful lesson, so they are unlikely to try and push that agenda before any elections.

If the republicans only offer up a platform of "we hate Obama, and he is not really the president and a Nazi (a black one at that??) and a socialist...they will succeed in uniting all of the right wing and lots of the posters on ET, but how many moderates will they attract? Is that a viable strategy to get young voters? Yes, we know that they will carry the South, but that is just not enough for them to become a dominate party again.

During the Bush years the Republicans were the majority party, for the most part. Yet they did not aggressively push an agenda of shrinking government. They slowed the growth of government, but they did not eliminate whole departments as once promised. Fighting the War on Terror would naturally call for growth in the DOD, various Intelligence services and Homeland Security, but not so much everything else. The fact that they allowed govt to continue to grow and approved the wall street bailouts, put a stamp of approval on big government before the eyes of the American people.

More...

I'm confused. You say the republicans can't win with a real conservative, but you also seem to be criticizing them for pursuing middle of the road policies.

I do think you have a point. Bush was a disaster, and the republicans accomplished little in their time in control of the congress. The question is whether their future lies in continuing these policies by running candidates such as McCain or going in a different direction.

I won't vote for any DemocRAT or Nutcase Republican (all of them) again, but Republicans are DELUSIONAL if they don't wake up to the reality that the demographic trends in the U.S. are going to put them at real risk of extinction if they fail to dramatically evolve - really quickly.

It's time for Republicans to marginalize the religious, racist, southern elements in their party, lest they be destined for the ash bin of history.

The trend is like a massive tsunami, and without a fundamental change, it will drown the GOP and carry it out to sea.